My travel diaries
Tuesday 31 July, 2007 - Sost, Karakoram Highway, Pakistan
By yesterday's standards we have a comparatively late start from Chilas this morning: breakfast at 7 and on the road at 7.30. Initially, we continue through the rocky desert terrain we saw for most of yesterday afternoon, with the Indus on our left, steep rocky walls on both sides and not much of a view, but after an hour or so of heading east, the road crosses the Indus and turns north. At this point the valley starts to widen, with more extensive views of mountains all around.
Nanga Parbat
Then, for about 10 to 15 minutes, Nanga Parbat appears behind us. At 8125m it's the 9 th highest mountain in the world, and has an interesting history associated with attempts to climb it. The British mountaineer Albert Mummery died on the mountain with his two Gurkha porters in 1895. In 1934, four German climbers and six of their sherpas perished in a long drawn-out retreat from the summit plateau in a storm. In 1936, seven more Germans and nine sherpas were wiped out when a huge avalanche engulfed their camp high on its slopes. In 1950 two more Britons died attempting the peak. But its first ascent in 1953 by the German Hermann Buhl is one of the greatest feats of endurance in the history of mountaineering. He set out alone, without bottled oxygen, at 2.30am on 3 rd July, and with 1200m of ascent and about 4 horizontal miles to traverse. He reached the summit 16½ hours later, at 7pm. Without enough daylight to descend, he spent the night standing on a ledge with his ski sticks in one hand and a small hold in the other, before continuing at dawn. Emaciated and hallucinating from exhaustion, he finally staggered into camp at 7pm on 4 th July, more than 40 hours after he had set out.
Nanga Parbat's isolation means that all ascents must start from a much lower altitude than other 8000m peaks. The Polish climber Jerzy Kukuczka described it as the only mountain which is climbed through all four seasons, from baking summer at its base to minus 40º at the summit, and Willy Merkl, who died in the 1934 tragedy, named his fantastically pastoral 1932 campsite the Marchenwiese, or Fairy Meadow, a name that remains to this day. From our position on the Karakoram Highway, Nanga Parbat looks to have a nice easy trapezoidal shape to its summit ramparts, but is guarded below by some horrendous looking avalanche-prone ice cliffs that extend for thousands of metres.
The bus stops and we get out to take photographs. A young boy tries to sell me a rock for 10 dollars. I point out to him that there are rocks all around us and ask him what's so special about his rock that makes it so expensive, but I don't think he understands me. As we pull away he continues to run alongside the bus waving his rock at me through the window until he can't keep up any longer.
At about 10.30 the bus stops by a roadside inn.
"Here is my boss," says Sharif.
Sure enough, standing outside this small building, apparently in the middle of nowhere, is David Hamilton, a tall rangy Scot, and one of Britain's most experienced high altitude mountaineers. He will be leading our ascent of Muztag Ata, and already knows several people on the bus: Luigi, a Swiss climber who attempted Muztag Ata with David last year when they had severe weather in the high camps which prevented anyone from reaching the summit, and Toby and Lindsay, whom he led up Cotopaxi and Chimborazo in Ecuador three years ago.
Gilgit
Another couple of hours' drive gets us to Gilgit, the largest town in northern Pakistan. Here we start to see women for the first time since leaving Islamabad. We see off Moeen, who leaves us here, and wait in the reception area of a hotel while David and Sharif try to track down Abdullah, a high altitude guide who is to come with us to Muztag Ata. Apparently Pakistanis sometimes have difficulty getting permits to travel over the border into China, but David reckons that if Abdullah masquerades as a pedlar going to trade at the markets in Kashgar, the Chinese customs officers might let him through. At any rate, it's got to be worth a shot. When Abdullah eventually appears he's bearing gifts of a pakol for each person on the bus, the traditional Afghan and Pakistani round-topped flat caps. They're a bit itchy on the scalp, but all I need is beard now, and perhaps a Kalashnikov, to complete my Taliban look. Might cause a problem at the border, though.
Rakaposhi and Hunza
We have lunch in Gilgit and hit the road again shortly after two. From this moment on the scenery becomes a lot more interesting. First, we pass by Rakaposhi, one of HW Tilman's Two Mountains and a River (from the title of his book, the other mountain being Muztag Ata), a huge wall of ice and rock rising more or less 6000m straight up from the road on our right. Tilman attempted the Southwest Ridge of Rakaposhi with Hans Gyr in 1947, but reached a point on the ridge a full 1800m below the summit. It was climbed for the first time in 1958, by British climbers Mike Banks and Tom Patey.
At about 4 o'clock we enter the Hunza valley, an amazing landscape containing islands of irrigated civilisation perched high on rocky ledges, and linked by zig-zag paths. Fields and poplars are prevalent among the otherwise arid rocky landscape. Rock spires protrude into the sky with higher snow-capped peaks glimpsed behind them. This valley of continuous fertile settlements stretches for several miles along and above the Hunza River. We turn off the main highway up a hill to Karimabad, the main village in the Hunza valley.
"If you only come along the Karakoram Highway once in your life, you have to visit this place," says David.
The road winds higher up the side of the valley. Above us is another snow-capped mountain called Ultar II (7388m), first climbed in 1996 by a pair of Japanese climbers, one of whom tragically died on the descent after 9 day struggle through blizzard conditions with very little food. Thrusting up alongside it is an interesting extreme rock pinnacle known, somewhat unfortunately, as the Lady Finger. Its real name is Bubulimating.
Karimabad
David is right. This has to be one of the most beautiful villages I've ever visited, high above this verdant valley of browns and greens, and looking across at the three snow-capped giants of Malubiting (7458m), Diran (7270m) and Rakaposhi (7790m) towering above the settlements opposite, and enshrouded in puffy altocumulus clouds with blue skies overhead. We stop at an inn, and David orders tea and cake while the rest of us go for a stroll up the hill towards the old fort. There are several tourist shops here, and a much more friendly feel to the place. Women walk around freely, one of them even says hello to me, and a couple of shops advertise themselves as "women's development projects." The reason for this more liberal atmosphere is that we're now in a region where Ismaili-Nizaris are prevalent, followers of a more moderate branch of Islam headed by the Aga Khan, who now lives in Switzerland.
Before I reach the old fort at the top of the village, I'm way-laid by a friendly man who sees me photographing Rakaposhi and invites me around to his house. I have only a few minutes, but I'm intrigued, so I accept. We walk further up the cobbled road to the fort, then he turns off into a narrow sloping passageway between houses. At his home he turns to gesture behind him.
"As you see, I have a nice view from my door," he says.
He has an amazing view, and I tell him so. In fact, he must have one of the most picturesque views anywhere in the world, looking out for miles over pretty villages, with Rakaposhi dominating the horizon opposite. His house turns out to be just one room. There is a baby in a cradle whom we wake up when we sit down and start talking. Half of the room is covered in mattresses, a quarter is kitchen area and the rest is floor. He tells me he has 3 sons and 3 daughters between ages 1 and 12, and they all live in this one room.
"In summer I sometimes work at trekking, while the rest of the time I'm a farmer. I am just a poor man though, and if you can spare me just a few rupees I would be very happy."
He speaks very good English and seems genuine. It's been interesting seeing the inside of his house and I've enjoyed talking to him, so I'm quite happy to give him some spare change before shaking his hand and hurrying off for cake and coffee. I walk briskly down the hill back to the inn, and when I arrive only David and Geoff are there, sitting in a garden looking out over the valley.
"Some bloke invited me into his house," I tell them.
"Oh, him," says David, without waiting for further description. "He's always there; a man with a squint who stands on a corner waiting for people to stop and take photographs, engages them in conversation, invites them round to his house, introduces them to his children, tells them how poor he is and then asks them for money."
"Er, yes, that's him," I reply.
When the others arrive ten minutes later after a quick tour of the fort, Juliet remarks favourably on the women's development projects that I also noticed.
"Yes, they know how to push the right tourist buttons," says David. "They're actually just jewellery shops, though I expect some women do help to produce the jewellery."
I don't whether Juliet bought anything, but the expression on her face suggests that's now two of us who feel like suckers.
We leave Karimabad at 6 and continue along the Karakoram Highway. The road climbs higher above the river and the scenery becomes increasingly dramatic. We are surrounded by tall rock pinnacles fluted with ice cornices. To our left glaciers spill down the mountainsides almost to the road. Unfortunately the latter part of this journey is done in the dark and all I can see out of my window are silhouettes. We arrive at the border settlement of Sost at 8.40. Lorries are parked up alongside the road awaiting passage across the border. We check into a fairly basic hotel and dine almost immediately. Once again the food is good and I eat well before turning in for the night. It's been a short day today; just 13 hours on the road this time.Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Next
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